Staff —

Effectiveness of a YouTube video takedown: zilch

Shut it off one place, it just appears somewhere else. Take out a major player …

Today's edition of Viddy Well had me killing time checking out funny videos online. Somehow "me and the boys" in IRC ended up on the topic of the great Roomba, and before you know it, the hilarious (IMO) "Woomba" spoof comes up. I'm off to find a link to show Jeff Smykil, because he's such an innocent soul, he hasn't seen it yet.

Second stop is StupidVideos.com, and they've got it. Watch, laugh, cry, tell everyone how good SNL was "in the old days."

Anyway, lookie there. Who else in my Google search has the video? The third stop does, the fourth, the fifth, the sixth, but not the seventh or eighth, as they were linking to YouTube. At this point, I stopped checking every link, except to note that the video is indeed scattered about everywhere.

The lesson in all of this? I think this shows that the Viacoms of the world are barking up the wrong tree, once again. Shut it off one place, it just appears somewhere else. Take out a major player, and another one moves in to fill the void. If you're thinking this sounds a lot like the P2P merry-go-round, you're right. And it's just about as effective, which is to say that it isn't effective. Sure, YouTube users now run into more and more videos that have been pulled, but the material is still online. In fact, I'd wager that not a few of the sites that still carry Woomba benefit even more by the YouTube takedown.

A smarter strategy would be to embrace the free advertising and promo services provided by YouTube, and make the most of it. And, knowing that stemming the tide of "copyright infringement" is near impossible, the focus should change from takedowns to taking on the competition: build a better portal, a better presentation. Control your content by providing for the best distribution possible.

Viacom may make some money off of one shakedown, but that approach will hurt them in the long run.

Ken Fisher
Ken is the founder & Editor-in-Chief of Ars Technica. A veteran of the IT industry and a scholar of antiquity, Ken studies the emergence of intellectual property regimes and their effects on culture and innovation. Emailken@arstechnica.com//Twitter@kenfisher